“Mikey, I’m not doing this. It’s too dangerous,” I said, stamping my foot in the thin layer of snow coating the frozen ground beneath us.
“Oh, quit being such a wuss. We’ll be fine,” he proclaimed, tugging my arm.
“No! No, Mikey, stop it!” I wailed, collapsing to the ground dramatically. I knew he wouldn’t keep trying to drag my dead weight.
“Fine. If you won’t go with me, I’ll just have to do it by myself.”
He released his grasp and shuffled to the ice. My heart pounded like a jackhammer in my tiny chest.
“Mikey please, you’re going to get hurt!” I cried, tears beginning to blur my vision.
“Caleb shut up, I’m trying to concentrate,” he retorted, calculating each footfall with a precision that my six-year-old mind couldn’t comprehend.
I held my breath, anxiously anticipating the tragedy that I feared would come. Mikey continued to scoot across the frozen lake, oblivious to the danger he was in. A few tense seconds later, and he’d reached the midway point.
“See Caleb? You were being a big crybaby for noth-”
Crack.
A massive fracture erupted below Mikey’s feet, spider webbing across the glassy surface on which he stood. My brother’s face drained of color as the consequence of his blunder crashed down on him like a ton of bricks. The ice groaned beneath his weight. Mikey didn’t have much time.
“Don’t move. I’m going to get Grandpa,” I said, praying that I would make it back in time.
“Hurry. Please,” Mikey whispered through clenched teeth, his hazel eyes pleading with me to keep my word.
I turned to the house. It was only a few yards away. I could make it if I-
Splash.
The thin layer of ice separating Mikey and the frigid waters below gave way, plunging him into the wintery depths.
“Help! Help!” he wailed, thrashing wildly as I sprinted to the house.
I ran as fast as my little legs would carry me. By the time I made it inside, I was wheezing and sputtering nonsense.
“Grandpa! Mikey. Ice. Fell. Drowning,” I cried, pointing out the window and to the lake, where Mikey was visible flailing his arms, desperate to escape his frozen prison.
Grandpa instantly understood. He leapt from his armchair and bolted to the shed. He returned moments later with a long bundle of rope. He brushed past me, running quicker than I knew a man his age was capable. Once we reached Mikey, he was still floundering, struggling to keep his head above water.
“Mike! Can you still feel your fingers?” Grandpa shouted. His presence calmed my brother somewhat as his convulsive, erratic motions began to subside.
“Y-yeah,” Mikey said, teeth chattering.
“Good. I need you to take this rope and tie it around yourself. I’m going to hoist you out.”
Mikey nodded as Grandpa tossed the line into the freezing water next to him. Mikey hurriedly obeyed, fastening a knot around his torso.
“Hold on tight, boy.”
Just as Grandpa was about to heave, Mikey suddenly disappeared into the murky depths. The line was being gulped into the water at a sickening rate. I turned to my grandfather. The look of fear rooted in his visage is one that I hope I never witness again.
The rope continued to disappear until it went tight in Grandpa’s grip. He braced for the impact and held firm as the mysterious force dragged him a few feet closer to the water. My heart palpitated furiously as he slid, dread seeping into my bones.
Grandpa pulled, summoning every ounce of strength remaining in his weary muscles. Eventually, he began to make progress. Inch by inch, Grandpa was winning the battle. And then, all at once, the line went slack, and Grandpa fell flat on his ass. Something big burst from the hole, flopping onto the ice and sliding toward us. It was Mikey.
His face was starting to turn blue and he wasn’t breathing. Grandpa reeled him in the rest of the way. He began CPR, laying my brother on the sturdy snow-covered ground and starting chest compressions. Blood thumped in my ears and tears began streaming down my rosy cheeks. I was certain that Mikey was dead.
A few dozen abdominal thrusts later, and Mikey coughed up water, returning to life as he frantically gasped for air. Gradually, the color began to return to his face. I breathed a sigh of relief and threw my arms around his soaking body.
“Don’t ever do that again. I thought you died,” I sobbed, clutching him in a vice grip. He didn’t return my embrace.
“M-Mikey?”
What I saw once I pulled away chilled me to my core. My brother sat motionless, staring at me with wide vacant eyes. He didn’t so much as twitch from the cold. His dead emotionless face sent panic rippling through me.
“What’s wrong with him, Grandpa?”
“I don’t know,” he said as he scooped Mikey into a fireman’s carry, “but we need to get him out of the elements. Once we get inside, I need you to dial 9-1-1, okay?” I nodded, diligently following behind him.
The paramedics arrived shortly after I called. They treated Mikey for mild hypothermia on the way to the hospital. They needed to take him in to make sure his stint under the water hadn’t done any permanent damage to his brain. I was a bundle of nerves the whole way to the emergency room.
Grandpa had gone with Mikey in the ambulance, so I rode with Grandma to meet them. She reassured me the best she knew how, but it did little good. My mind was a jumbled mess of thoughts and emotions. Why didn’t he just listen to me? What was he thinking? What pulled him under for so long? And the one that really stuck with me: Was this my fault? I should have tried harder to stop him.
Guilt gnawed at me like piranhas devouring a slab of meat. I wasn’t really to blame, was I? I tried to cram the notion to the furthest compartment of my brain as we pulled into the parking lot. We signed in at the front desk, and a few painstaking minutes later, we were reunited with Mikey and Grandpa.
Mikey gazed at nothing in particular, his glassy eyes staring at the empty cream-colored wall. I tentatively approached him. I slowly reached toward him, terror stabbing through my chest like a butcher knife. Sweat pooled above my brow as my fingertips grazed his arm. Mikey suddenly snapped toward me, snatching my wrist with an intensity that no nine-year-old should possess.
I froze in shock. Mikey’s grip was ice cold, searing my skin with his touch. And those eyes. His pupils bore straight into mine. The loathing hatred behind them sent chills undulating down my spine. I was stuck there. I couldn’t move. I couldn’t scream. I couldn’t even look to my grandparents for help. The world melted away, leaving the two of us alone in a nauseating staring match.
“Caleb? Caleb,” I was pulled back to reality by Grandpa’s worried voice. He lightly shook my shoulders.
“Oh, yeah. Sorry Grandpa.”
“I need you to scoot over, buddy. Dr. Kent here needs to run some tests on Mikey.”
I obliged, joining Grandma. I glanced at Mikey, failing to meet his gaze. He’d returned to fixating on nothing, staring straight ahead at that featureless nondescript wall. After sufficiently poking and prodding my brother, the doctor returned to us.
“His physical reactions seem normal enough. However, it does concern me that he isn’t speaking or responding to stimuli. There may be some permanent damage, but we’ll need to do a CAT scan to be sure.”
My grandparents grimly locked eyes. Grandpa nodded to Dr. Kent.
“Okay. Do it.”
Mikey had to stay in the ER until the early hours of the morning. All the while, he didn’t utter so much as a cough. The medical staff performed a myriad of different tests on him, which seemingly all reached the same conclusion: my brother was fine.
Finding nothing out of the ordinary, Mikey was discharged. Dr. Kent instructed Grandpa to take him to his personal physician if the odd behavior continued and explained that there was nothing else he could do. He thanked him and we left, tired and frustrated by the lack of results.
We finally arrived home at four in the morning, nodding off and ready for some much-needed rest. Well, everyone except for Mikey. That same fish-eyed expression was pasted on his face. I shuddered just looking at him.
I was almost disappointed when the doctors didn’t find anything. If they had, at least we’d know why Mikey was acting this way. Instead, we were left with no explanation, no signs of improvement, and no answers.
I passed out the moment my head hit the pillow. My sleep-addled brain had been working in overdrive for the entire evening, and I was pooped. Grandma tucked me in, wishing me sweet dreams. As the door creaked shut and my vision faded to black, Mikey faced the wall opposite me in the fetal position. The thought that he might actually be getting some much-needed sleep comforted me, and I was lulled into a peaceful slumber.
I awoke with a start in the middle of the night. My heart was racing and my pajamas were drenched in sweat. My eyes frantically darted from side to side as they adjusted to the darkness. I attempted to lift my arm, but I was frozen. I couldn’t move a muscle. I panicked. I tried to kick, to flail, to scream, anything. But it was all futile. There was no doubt about it. I had sleep paralysis.
Just when I was thinking that I should shut my eyes and try to nod off, I heard it. A shuffling noise from across the room. My blood turned to ice and I slowed my breathing, listening intently. I waited, my mind running wild with possibilities. And then I heard it again. But this time, it was closer. Much closer.
Tears welled in the corners of my eyes as terror surged through me. Slowly, a shape began to emerge in my field of vision. A humanoid shape. Mikey’s face gradually slid into view. He hovered inches above me, his wide, unblinking eyes staring hungrily at my motionless form. I could feel his hot musty breath wafting into my nostrils as I staved off the urge to vomit.
He stayed there for what felt like ages, immobile and unwavering, those cold dead eyes boring into my psyche and rooting themselves in my nightmares. Out of nowhere, Mikey began to lean in closer, until he was directly next to my ear. What he whispered still gives me chills to this day.
“Please. Help me. It wants my soul.”
Mikey then disappeared from view and scuttled back to his bed. My heart pounded so hard that I thought it was liable to leap from my chest at any given moment. What the hell was that? I lay in silent hysteria as my still-developing brain struggled to comprehend what I had just seen. Somehow, I calmed myself enough to return to a fitful slumber.
I awoke that morning hyperventilating. I think something has taken hold of Mikey and I’m afraid that it wants to take me next.